This is my account of our day-to-day life in the French Pyrénées, initially in the unspoilt Ariège department and then further west along the chain, where wild boar and deer are prevalent, where birds of prey call as they circle overhead catching the thermals, where wild produce is available in abundance and where both the summer and the winter outdoor sports enthusiast is spoilt for choice!

Monday, 10 January 2011

A little excursion

Well, after my last post on Thursday regarding lack of energy, things didn't get any better over the weekend. I was going to go out for a roadie ride with Andy on Saturday, but, 5 minutes down the road, I was in such discomfort from my sit bones for some reason that I had no choice but to turn back! So, instead of a bike ride, I thought I would have a run with the pooch in the Puivert area. I had a nice 14km circuit planned out, mainly on the flat, but just 3kms in, I was already struggling. It was just too much like hard work! It shouldn't be like this, with every stride a struggle! What's going on? I did the only sensible thing and turned around to head back to the car, dispirited, frustrated and just a tad pissed off at my patheticness. Still, both the pooch and I had had a mini stretch of the legs, which is better than sitting on your bum, isn't it!

The weather yesterday was dire so we had a work day. But today the blue skies returned. Andy and I headed up to Comus on the Plateau de Sault and picked up the track that would eventually lead us up to the Talc mines of Luzenac. The initial 2.7km of track is a gradual descent but it was treacherously icey which prevented us from breaking out of a rather hesitant walk. But on the long steady ascent up the track to the Mines de Luzenac we enjoyed a rather more amendable layer of fresh powder which made the going easier. After 8.5kms, the landscape opened out and the Pic de Soularac loomed in front of us.... beautiful!After a bite to eat, we turned around to retrace our steps and had an enjoyable trot back down.

The thin layer of powder on the track was an animal tracker's dream. We saw fresh wild boar and small deer tracks and also some very large prints (double Taff's pawprint size) which had us puzzled. But we think it was probably just a very large dog whose footsteps we were following?We had covered 17kms/739m+ and had been out for 2hrs 45m by the time we arrived back at the car. And I felt OK. Thank goodness :-)

This evening, at 19.01 local time, we watched the international space station zip across the clear skies. It's always an impressive site and a pleasure to see.